Few people have experienced the kind of trauma that the Richard family of Dorchester has. The patriarch, Bill, appeared in court on the second day of the trial of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, whose defense team admitted their client’s involvement, and shared the harrowing experience his wife and children fell victim to.
It’s impossible to relate to the kind of pain and suffering Bill and his wife Denise have endured. One would barely notice though, based on the composure and stoicism exhibited by Bill on the stand Thursday afternoon.
He described his family as active, one that thoroughly enjoyed taking part in city activities not unlike the annual Boston Marathon. In fact, attending the Marathon was a tradition that extended back before the Richard family was born to when both Bill and Denise were college students.
They made it a point, though, to anoint their children – Jane, Martin and Henry – into the same ritual of joining the spectator ranks on Marathon Monday as they had years prior.
The three kids loved it, Bill recalled. Not only were they privy to free ice cream and smoothie samples, “I can even remember the details of what each of them ordered,” Bill said, but every year at least one Richard would know someone pounding the 26.2-mile course.
On April 15, 2013, the Richards were there to support the children’s coaches.
“We were all simply looking up Boylston and we heard a thunderous explosion down towards the finish line, and everybody just kind of looked down towards the finish line and really didn’t know what to make of it,” recalled Bill. “The first thing that popped into my head was a sewer explosion.”
Just seconds later, Bill would try to collect his family while shielding them from agonizing trauma.
He found Henry first, disoriented and terrified.
Henry then pointed out Jane who was lying on the pavement behind Bill, unaware that one of her legs was torn from her body. He carried them both across the street. It would later be amputated below the knee.
Denise was close by, kneeling over Martin.
“When I saw Martin’s condition, I knew he wasn’t going to make it,” said Bill. “I saw a little boy who had his body severely damaged from an explosion. I just knew from what I saw there was no chance – the color of his skin and so on.”
Denise caught some shrapnel in one of her eyes and lost the sight there. Bill suffered shrapnel, burns and partial hearing loss as well.
But his injuries will never stop him from hearing the echoes of his young son’s voice, or the apparent happiness and optimism easily detectable in Martin’s and his family’s tones.
“I can still hear music, I can still hear the beautiful voices of my family,” said Bill.
Nothing will wash away the recollections of that day now stained in Bill’s memory. Shortly after his family was accounted for and admitted to local hospitals, Bill went home and took time to reflect on what had happened in a shower. There’s not enough hot water in the world that could’ve purified what had historically been a beautiful day for the Richards.
“I just couldn’t get the smell off my body and it was making me nauseous,” said Bill in closing. “It was just my time to think about the days, the weeks [and] the months ahead. It was just my time to get that awful smell off my body, to really put into perspective what had happened to our family.”
